Feingold to Dems: Don't play it safe

Senator gets rousing reception at convention
By David Callender, http://www.madison.com

LA CROSSE -- Wisconsin Democrats will need to do more than tap popular discontent with President Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress if they want to win this fall's elections, U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold told a cheering audience at the state Democratic Party Convention on Friday.

Democrats will not win "if we play it safe," said Feingold, who has staked out some of the boldest positions in the U.S. Senate by voting against the war in Iraq, calling for a deadline for the withdrawal of U.S. troops there and proposing that lawmakers censure the president for his domestic spying programs.

"We will not win by default. We will not win by running down the clock," he said. "People will perceive if we are not standing on principles. They will perceive if we are fearful and weak, if we do not stand up for what we believe in. That is the only way we truly win."

He added that if Democrats fail to do that, "we don't deserve to win."

Feingold got some of the biggest applause of the night from the crowd of about 1,000 party activists, topping that of even Gov. Jim Doyle, who will head the party's ticket this fall.

While Feingold, who is exploring a 2008 presidential bid, has often taken more positions to the left of Doyle, he praised the first Democratic governor to win office in 16 years for showing "enormous courage" by vetoing Republican attempts to restrict embryonic stem cell research.

Feingold also called a proposed amendment to the state constitution to ban same-sex marriages "an attempt to defeat the governor's re-election," implying that the measure is intended primarily to get conservative voters to the polls.

He predicted that Wisconsin would be the first state in the nation to defeat such an amendment and blasted a similar effort by Senate Republicans last week as a bid to put "discrimination into the U.S. Constitution to torment other people," a line that won him a standing ovation.

Reflecting those sentiments, convention delegates voted overwhelmingly to put the party on record as opposing the proposed state amendment.

"We're the first state party in the country to do so, which is kind of shameful" for the rest of the country, said state Democratic Party chairman Joe Wineke. "But no one here even thought (opposing the amendment) was controversial."

Doyle, who is running against U.S. Rep. Mark Green, R-Green Bay, appeared to take Feingold's advice by tying his opponent to the Bush administration and offering a list of his first-term accomplishments and a vision for his second term.

Doyle never mentioned Green by name, but said the campaign will give voters "a choice between the way we do things here in Wisconsin and the way they get done in Washington - a choice between Wisconsin values and Washington values."

He said those Wisconsin values were upheld by balancing the biggest budget deficit in state history without raising state taxes, providing low-cost prescription drugs for senior citizens in a plan that costs less than the federal Medicare prescription drug benefit, and increasing student aid.

The governor also pointed to his efforts to bring oil company executives to Wisconsin to testify about rising gasoline prices and called on Congress to both repeal previous tax breaks for oil companies and "return excess profits to the people who pay more every time they go to the pump."

Doyle repeatedly said his policies were "the right thing to do and we're doing it," but acknowledged "there's a lot more to be done."

Doyle's goals for a second term include making health care coverage more affordable to all Wisconsin residents, guaranteeing that all middle school students who "do well stay in school and stay out of trouble" and get a university or technical college education, and expanding the state's biotechnology industry.

He also reiterated his support for embryonic stem cell research, arguing that "it means hope" for those suffering from diseases ranging from juvenile diabetes to Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. Green has said he supports existing federal limits on embryonic stem cell research.

Doyle noted how his mother, who died last month after a 30-year battle with Parkinson's disease, benefited from medical advances in the 1960s and 1970s. He said that stem cell research offers even greater advances for those still living with the disease.

He noted that much of the pioneering embryonic stem cell research has been done in Wisconsin and said "the governor of Wisconsin has a special obligation to ... all the families confronting disease and disability."

"I will not turn my back on these families. I will never let partisan politics slam the door on hope for these families," Doyle said. "For as long as I am governor, Wisconsin will lead the nation in stem cell research. We will find the cure to these awful diseases, and we should be so proud that this state will lead the way."

(See related links for story on attorney general candidates Kathleen Falk and Peg Lautenschlager.)

E-mail: dcallender@madison.com

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